after christmas eve

i woke up in the middle of the night and, unable to go back to sleep, i went into the living room. after candles had been lit, presents exchanged and candidly opened, wishes made, laughter heard, candles blown out, doors shut behind, everything lay now before me, left to itself, in the quietness of another life, unseen, unknown.

this is what the christmas tree - what everything - looks like when photographed in the dark, camera held tight against my chest - our real nature revealed: light.

under the tree, there lay the puzzle we had completed together, before going to bed. i could have thought of some symbolic meaning, the setting was right for such deep, important visions. yet all i could think of was how beautifully the world glimmered in the dark, and how dangerously frail its unsteady contours appeared - dream-like.

there i found her shoes, too. she had insisted to wear these ones, fond as she was of the little white stars on the straps. you cannot see the stars now - but this is how it always is with stars, perhaps. they are never to be seen, only to be imagined, especially at night.

these are the rail tracks of a train which never stops running, even when bridges between here and there have broken down. 

later, when she finds out that all trains eventually stop, she will hopefully have a friend to sing for her: When darkness comes / And pain is all around / Like a bridge over troubled water / I will lay me down / Sail on, silvergirl / Sail on by / I’m sailing right behind / Like a bridge over troubled water / I will ease your mind / Like a bridge over troubled water / I will ease your mind.

for now, she and her best friend chilly willy are still unaware of the big, important task which lies before them (and at which they will fail, i know. i would like to believe, as some say, that failing is part of the music, but here - i honestly don't know). 

things have been falling apart, recently, and how quickly. and now, i wonder at how still and poised they are, peaceful, unto themselves, unaware of grace and falling, all these things that we don't know how to look at. 

you called me the other day and told me that my voice - you had always said about my voice that it had "the sound of bells", and i would always laugh about such silliness - puts you at peace with the world.

i remember how, every time emily left, bagpuss and all the others would wake up. yet here, things hadn't come to life, they were motionless and quiet, as they always were. 

still, among them, in the dark of the night, some stir of life, slight as the drifting of a curtain, came into being. perhaps it was i, and not things, that was coming to life, unawares. 

and the whitest of orchids

no matter how  - and the whitest of orchids is ashen cloud against my glow -
no matter how warm, how bright, how pure -
i have failed. one always fails. i have asked, just once, just this time, for a different law: that i might be allowed to cross the bridge. that the radiance of what i am, the entire constellation of what is called, i suppose, "myself", could reach you at the other end, fill you like a beam of light. you, shattered with recognition, my orchid thrusting its roots into you, growing out of your mouth. the only possible path for what is, and cannot be any other way.

no. the truth of a person cannot be lifted, as one would lift a piece of luggage before a hasty departure, cannot be transferred and placed into another, to grow there, quietly, like a seed. one flower, and only one, carried within, inscribed into itself, from the beginning. the truth of the seed cannot be broken, cannot be warped into anything else. yet no matter how i hurry to reach your arms, the one who looks at me from there, invented by you, grins back, her face an ugly, pitiful mask.

there is nothing more treacherous than bridges. they give one hope, one ardently takes one step after another only to find oneself, at some point, suspended above the abyss and the other waving welcome, just one more step and i will catch you, i will hold you, beloved, unaware that the defilement is already at work, in each word, in each gesture, that the fall into time has already begun.

lightness & laughter

floating, she used to whisper ~

no weeds would dance more freely than her hair,
when the floods come to wipe away
every sin. no breath caressed the skin
 ~ or so she had convinced even the most indifferent lover ~
more ecstatically than her own
(more tenderly, when the moon was right).

when she was finally ready to see
that the sweet virtues of lightness were still
a lie, it was already too late:
they had all been fooled.
the lovers, even in the most ardent arms,
would still remember her breath and even the flood,
she feared, would carry her away with more grace
than a tree.

it was too late to protest, too late to explain:
quietly, she sat down in a corner
and burst into laughter.

the bench that should have been

i remember us on the bench that has never been,
the light playing on our shoulders and
what would have been our face, had we really existed.
i turn to you,
my breath tearing through you like a whip,
a silver snake in the dark.

i don't speak.
my words echo thus, but not in your mind:
on your trembling hands, your bending knees,
in your throat.

you haven't come. to what purpose disturb the dust
on a bench that has never been, i do not know.
other voices inhabit me
that you will never know, either.

i turn to you and light my cigarette
only because i know you love this burning
and mourning of ashes, this beauty of mine now,
behind the veil of flesh.
i blow the smoke, gently, into what
would have been your wound, had you been there,
my cry, that we can bear only so much paleness.

i remember the moment that should have been,
had the future been your cat's ball of speckled yarn,
my poem.

..

those questions

blinded by my colours
will you ever know
my flesh of night

.
.

reading Kafka, a not-so-hermetic screenplay for autumn nights

inspired by Prospero's last comment
(and secretely dedicated to him, the music-omniscient one)

(please excuse the poor quality of the compression - alas, what can i do, unfortunately the Bridge, albeit miraculously still floating, is not enhanced with such awesome technical abilities)


update:
it seems that for some readers the screenplay was indeed hermetic, in spite of my intentions, because the clip didn't work. if you cannot watch the slideshow, but you are keen on seeing it anyway (completely futile for the ones who have already reached satori while contemplating the white rectangle :-), try going here

last song

the unspoken question











endlessly asked



the last meeting










happening all over again





Meredith Monk - Last Song


S.B. wrote me that my post reminded him of this great song.
He also added:

"When does time run out?

When will we go?"

je est un autre (colours 2)

at Black Sun's request (backed by Swiss), i give you the Romanian version as well. just in case you wondered about that strange language...
oh, and i have recorded it live with Gentle (who really is Gentle, i had to fight to get that cold voice out of her :-).
but i like the me/Swiss version much better, it's much more dramatic - i guess because of the greater contrast due to the female/male split.

poem 2 romanian
tr. Roxana
spoken by: Roxana & Gentle





and a sepia bonus of pictures:

je est un autre (colours 1)

This is the first post of a longer project on which i have been working, entitled je est un autre ('i is another', a famous quote from Rimbaud). It deals with the double and the other, symbolizing the multiplicity of the self and its thousand refractions (not a surprise, i hear you say :-).








There is also a poem which i once wrote on the same topic. And thanks to the endless creativity interplay on this web, the poem evolved into a 'poem for two voices', a gift that the ever amazing swiss (am i quoting you here, Joanne ? :-) made me soon afterwards. He echoed each line of mine with his words (an answer, which leads to many other questions - forever open):

the untold stories

those stories

plunging their roots

growing out of you

into the bone of

blooming

my heart

uncontrollable

poisonous and hungry

that foliage

the unwritten sisters and

that becomes sibling

daughters of mine

child, your flesh

agitating their dark foliage

abundance

in me

unbearable

listen to me you

listen to me

to whose feet my untold

there are stories

stories

washing around you

my unwritten

unheard, un-noticed

bodies of despair command

their loss

me to kneel

forces you to your knees

they put a rope around

chokes the breath

my neck

in your throat

they take my

stuffs your mouth

mouth

with despair

they want revenge

what is it you want

they tear me

to fall

down

to go

in search of

what?

hear me out you

listen!

to whose feet I don’t

i am not

The strange dialogue which emerged therefrom compelled the readers to hear it spoken, as all poetry should basically be: living, breath-born word. Joanne-of-a-thousand-skills made a marvellous first audio version, to which you can listen here:


http://www.garageband.com/mp3player?|pe1|S8LTM0LdsaSgY1C1Ymk


Of course, being very curious myself and swiss - i dare say - not very far from this when it comes to playing with different materials, we couldn't refrain from wondering how we - the humble authors :-) - would enact it. If you are curious, you can listen to us here, but i must warn you: firstly, Joanne is a pro and we can't even dream of comparing ourselves with her and secondly, this is my first attempt at editing audio (even mixing our voices was a hell of a task for me). and we didn't even know that one needs 'stereo mikes' for something like this, as i was told later. So don't be too harsh on me/us :-)
(i have the courage to let you listen to this only because swiss liked it very very much)




poems for two voices, poem 2 (the unwritten stories)
Roxana & Swiss


Oh, and here is a slideshow for the ones who are really hungry for images (click on the small slideshow icon for full screen view):

answering a double call from beyond

Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day

You tell me of our future that you planned:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:

For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.

Christina Rossetti (Remember)

self-portrait with crescent moon

When I take photos I float

on the verge of myself.
I am many.

Larger than myself
yet I enclose myself no more.

I who is otherwise
filled to the brim with the past
learn to walk through the things
of the present
soundlessly but not quietly
until I am
a body without a face
a heartbeat without a body
the thin edge of light.

Stay with me, my fever,
dance with me, my pain,
swirl me into the shape
of what is being born
now.

When I take photos I float
float to the crescent moon

the white moon
until the soft cloud that I am
I am
casts her shadow upon your face
your pale face
you look up

slightly bewildered
stroke your skin
that skin
as if you tried to guess
what has just touched your soul
that soul
you only catch a glimpse
of my hair
my dark hair
in the mirror
in which the world
meets the world
and that too will soon be
gone
is now

gone.

When I take photos I float

on the verge of myself.
I am many.
Larger than myself
yet I enclose myself
no more.


I who is otherwise
filled to the brim with the past
learn to walk through the things
of the present
soundlessly but not quietly
until I am
a body without a face
a heartbeat without a body
the thin edge of light.

Stay with me, my fever,
dance with me, my pain,
swirl me into the shape
of what is being born
now.

When I take photos I float
float to the crescent moon
the white moon
until the soft cloud that I am
I am
casts her shadow upon your face
your pale face

you look up

slightly bewildered
stroke your skin
that skin
as if you tried to guess
what has just touched your soul

that soul
you only catch a glimpse
of my hair
my dark hair
in the mirror
in which the world
meets the world
and that too will soon be
gone
is now

gone.

(gratefully remembering how the first time I took the camera in my hands
felt like being born again)

she could be

she could be flotsam
tossed up
from a troubled sea
washed ashore
her hair black weed
her fingers
fragile anchors
dug into the sand

she could be sleeping
numbed into slumber
by the drowsy sun
as the shore steals
upon her
the salt water
seeping into her
landlocked flesh
and with a flick
of her tail
she is no longer
beachbound
but a sea creature
mer-woman
whose song entrances
the strongest sailor

or she is a swimmer
dragged herself back
exhausted, to shore
and spent, spreads
her arms wide
not sleeping
not dreaming
but listening
to the great pulse
of the sea
as it washes
back and forth
back and forth
through her


swiss (she could be)

pare să plutească
purtată de mare
până la ţărm
aruncată pe plajă
spălată de apă
alge pletele-i negre
mâinile ancoră
subţire-n nisip


pare să doarmă
furată de malul
fără sfârşit
legănată-n vis
de un soare moale
de sarea-nflorind
în carnea ei
devenită pământ
coada ei caldă
c-o unică lovitură
o poate întoarce
în apă oricând
femeia mării
renaşte vrăjind
vajnicul călător


ori a înotat poate
până în zări
pe mal obosită
s-a-ntins să audă
departe de somn
departe de vis
s-asculte doar
marele ritm
al mării cea mare
cum trece prin ea
val după val
înainte înapoi
înapoi înainte

pare să

(my translation)

Note:

I had posted this picture before but I wasn't happy with it and I took it down soon afterwards. Little did I know that swiss had already spotted it :-) inspired by it, he wrote this poem, that I did my best to translate into Romanian. More important than the images themselves, I think what matters here most is the rhythm imitating the waves, and I tried to get this 'sound' right (repetitions and alliterations being a precious way to achieving that). I am pretty satisfied with the result :-) and open to suggestions. And grateful to swiss, but he already knows it.

blue birds (2)

you must learn to see blue birds from now, I was told. you must learn to be someone else. after the last word was spoken. without. you must learn to unfold a life on the edge of this cutting silence, I was told.

must I? asked the little marquise quietly, and jumped on her wild horse. she led her black horse, which sometimes she called her pain, away into the blue morning, where blue birds fell from the sky and opened like flowers after the rain.

shall I obey, shall I defy, shall I take my revenge at the cusp of the sky...

when she reached the horizon line, where no eyes could follow her any more, she leant inside and, quickly, no hesitation in her white fingers, she strangled the black bird becoming alive in her grave, turning blue.

hush little bird, be quiet, be still. no god has ever risen through the scent of my hair. no stone has ever unfolded at the heart of the loss. I am the keeper of your death, the sacred door to the blue nothing.

What a strange world this is, where everything depends on the way another person feels.